Tuesday, 15 October 2013

The Miracle of the First Nuclear Test Ban

As we
approach the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination next
month, we would do well to recall the extraordinary events of the last year of
the president’s life. James W. Douglass — in his magisterial 2008 study JFK and the Unspeakable—persuasively
argues are significant keys to understanding his death. Douglass’s 12 years of
research led him to conclude that the president was killed because he was
beginning to shed the armor of the Cold Warrior — at the height of the Cold War
— and decided, instead, to become a peacemaker.

In the bipolar geopolitics of the
day, Kennedy’s job description committed him to full-on conflict with the
Soviet Union. The flash-points included Berlin, Vietnam and Cuba, and most
dangerous of all was the accelerating nuclear arms race. How risky it was
became clear with the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, when the world came
perilously close to a nuclear exchange that could have left hundreds of
millions dead.

The seeds of Kennedy’s unlikely move
toward peace were sown during this potentially catastrophic incident.
Successfully avoiding war in this situation not only meant making an accommodation
with his counterpart, Premier Nikita Khrushchev; it meant staring down the
forces within his own government, including the Joint Chiefs, that were
clamoring for an all-out nuclear attack. This experience seems to have
unleashed something in Kennedy. He felt his way toward challenging the
ideological framework of his day, leading him to sometimes-secret efforts to
make a dramatic shift in policy toward Cuba and the escalating war in Vietnam.
Most of all, Kennedy launched a series of initiatives to end the nuclear
threat, which, a few months before his death, resulted in the promulgation of
the Limited Test Ban Treaty, an historic agreement that prohibited signatories
— including the Americans and the Russians — from conducting nuclear tests in
the atmosphere and under the oceans.

Fifty years
ago today the Partial Test Ban Treaty went into effect. It was the fruit of
steps Kennedy took, including his groundbreaking
speech at American University earlier that year, which called for a
shift in nuclear policy, including a unilateral moratorium in nuclear testing,
proffered as an olive branch to the Soviet Union. That summer the barriers to
success came down, with the United States and USSR initiating the pact in July.
The challenge facing Kennedy was Senate ratification, where there was strong
opposition. In August, polling showed 80 percent of the public opposed the
treaty. Deciding that “a near miracle was needed,” Kennedy set out to change
public opinion, initiating a public awareness campaign, and. succeeded in
reversing the public’s attitude in a little over a month. Eighty percent of the
country backed the plan, resulting in the Senate approving the treaty 80-19.

Although it would be another quarter
of a century before the global Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty would end
below-ground nuclear tests, the partial test ban was an historic
accomplishment, having far-reaching environmental and political consequences.
There is also a treasure trove of lessons for us today, especially about the
capacity we have to make headway on seemingly impossible challenges.

The “miracle” Kennedy was seeking
was not so otherworldly after all. It began with his own risky steps toward a
different world — for which, Douglass’s research convincingly suggests, he paid
the ultimate price. Then there were the nitty-gritty mechanics of organizing
below the surface of national policy. Even in the doldrums of August,
organizers alerted, educated and mobilized the population to catalyze a shift
in public opinion — and, in turn, to generate support for peace in the Senate,
which was mired in the paralyzing ideology of the Cold War.

There are many times when we are
tempted to conclude that we do not have the ability to clamber out of the
political quicksand in which we are so often stuck, in a world where we have
traded the Cold War for a war on terror. Regimes of worldwide surveillance.
Widening gaps in income. The climate crisis. The “us vs. them” world of the
early 1960s has splintered into many hemorrhaging challenges.

Yet there is nothing magical or
metaphysical about our paralysis — or our liberation. It mostly requires a
combination of gumption and plodding work from which the “miracle” of change
can flow. This was true half a century ago, and it remains true today. [Abridged]

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About Me

I am not an academic. I have been a commercial beekeeper in New Zealand for most of my working life, except for four years in detention as a conscientious objector during WW2. Those years were particularly formative for me. I have retained my horror of war and the suffering still being caused by armed conflict and violence in so many places. My convictions have been nurtured by my Methodist church connection, though my pacifism has been deplored by some good people.

Expect no slick answers here; I am still a searcher myself. How can a just and peaceful society develop from this chaos, and what are the obstacles in the way?

Most of the articles posted here are from other sources. I look for writers, wherever they can be found, who can throw light on what is happening in our world. If you would like to learn a little more about myself, please read this biographical interview series conducted by my granddaughter, Kyla.